The first community-based centre aimed at preventing suicide will be opened in Dublin today by the Minister for Health.
Mary Harney will formally open the privately funded charity Pieta House at Lucan, Dublin this morning.
The Department of Health says the centre will address the gap in health services in Ireland by providing a "ground-breaking, professional therapeutic service, free of charge, for those in the community affected by suicide and self-harm".
Suicide now kills more people in the State each year than road crashes. Some 430 people died from suicide in 2005, compared to 368 killed on the roads.
Ms Harney will be joined by Dr John Connolly of the Irish Association for Suicidology and Joan Freeman, chief executive of Pieta House.
